Saturday, September 24, 2016

Conversation Piece (1974)

Born into nobility, the Italian director Luchino
Visconti had a unique perspective on the foibles of the upper class, and Visconti’s
penultimate film, Conversation Piece,
is in some ways a referendum on wealth. The protagonist uses his affluence to
separate himself from the rest of the world, transforming his historic villa
into a private museum filled with expensive artwork. The vulgar family that
barges into his home and demands permission to rent an upstairs apartment is
pure Eurotrash, transforming the whole world into the backdrop for their petty
psychodramas. Caught between these exemplars is a handsome young hustler who
has the aesthetic sophistication of the protagonist and the low morals of the
vulgarians. Not every filmmaker has the curiosity or integrity to dissect his
own social class and then present his findings to the world, no matter how
unflattering, so it’s to Visconti’s credit that Conversation Piece paints a grim picture. Whether the
movie also works as entertainment or even as a logical narrative is another
matter, because much of the plot is predicated upon far-fetched behavior.

The
Professor (Burt Lancaster) contentedly occupies his Roman villa until the
overbearing Marquise Bianca Brumonti (Silvana Mangano) shows up one day and
demands a visit to the Professor’s spare apartment. Despite his repeated
declarations that the rooms are not available for rent, she wears him down and
leases the space for her daughter, Lietta (Claudia Marsani). Thereafter, Lietta
begins elaborate remodeling without the Professor’s permission, leading to
friction, and the Professor becomes involved in the life of Konrad Hubel
(Helmut Berger), the Marquis’ lover. Eventually, Konrad uses the apartment as a
crash pad following a beating, so the Professor becomes Helmut’s unlikely
caretaker.

Conversation Piece can be taken at face
value as a human drama, and it can be interpreted as social or even political allegory. As with so many leftist European filmmakers who lived through World War
II, Visconti often used his work to ponder the big questions of how and why
society allows toxic influences to take root, and to celebrate individuals who
reject isolation for involvement. Named for a type of artwork the Professor collects, Conversation
Piece is perhaps most effective as exactly that—something to discuss after
it’s over—since watching the picture is a bit tiresome. The movie looks
beautiful, with elegant camerawork capturing meticulous sets and costumes, but
much of the onscreen behavior is unpleasantly histrionic. And while Lancaster’s
character is a beacon of decorum and sanity, his performance is mannered and
theatrical to a fault. Like the movie around him, Lancaster suffers for an
abundance of artifice, polemics, and stylization.